CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK

CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK;Rappers Making Notoriety Pay Off

By JON PARELES

Published: October 31, 1995

After all their skirmishes with those who want them silenced, rappers have learned at least one thing: how to make notoriety pay off. The politicians and public figures who pressed the Warner Music Group to dissolve its ties with Interscope Records have been, in essence, the warm-up act for "Dogg Food" by Tha Dogg Pound, which will be released today. Stores have ordered 1.7 million copies in advance.

The album, eagerly anticipated after repeated delays in its release, appears on Death Row Records, a division of Interscope. It will be distributed by Priority Records, the independent hip-hop label that has sold millions of albums by disturbing performers like N.W.A. True to the game, Tha Dogg Pound's rappers have been promising to be more outrageous than ever: "We believe in free speech, man, and we ain't holding nothing back," the rapper Kurupt told The Los Angeles Times.

Tha Dogg Pound is the latest project from Death Row Records, which has all but trademarked its own kind of gangsta rap, sometimes known as G-funk. The music has a relaxed swagger, with bass lines that echo Parliament-Funkadelic's 1970's hits and sustained keyboard lines floating high above; the raps are leisurely and utterly self-assured. What draws the denunciations is the lyrics, which are nonchalantly nasty. They describe a life of gunplay and drug dealing and pimping, threatening violence against their rivals and treating women and sex in the crudest, rudest terms. "Dogg Food" follows the usual blueprint, one that has racked up gross sales of more than $100 million.

Death Row's first multimillion-seller was "The Chronic," by Dr. Dre, a rapper and producer who had previously been with N.W.A. "The Chronic," released in 1992, introduced a guest rapper, Snoop Doggy Dogg; his debut album in 1993, "Doggystyle," has sold four million copies and made him the best-known rapper of the 1990's.

As his fame grew, Snoop Doggy Dogg was charged with murder over a drive-by shooting in August 1993; the rapper was in a car when prosecutors contend his former bodyguard shot a member of a rival gang. The charges convinced fans that Snoop was living the life he rapped about, boosting his image of machismo; for those who were disgusted by gangsta rap, they heightened fears that there was no gap between rap fantasy and reality. Last week, prosecutors said the charges might be dropped because a judge had limited the use of some taped statements as evidence.

Meanwhile, Death Row was exploiting its formula. Snoop Doggy Dogg raps helped sell two 1994 soundtrack albums, "Above the Rim" and "Murder Was the Case." Death Row's blockbuster albums have also included raps from the principals of Tha Dogg Pound: Kurupt (Ricardo Brown) and Daz (Delmar Arnaud), who is Snoop Doggy Dogg's cousin. There are cameo appearances on "Dogg Food" by Snoop Doggy Dogg -- "the one they wanna see," he observes -- as well as his brother Nate Dogg and others who may be warming up for their own Death Row albums. For the moment, Death Row seems to be for hip-hop what "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" was for 1970's sitcoms: a mother lode for spinoffs, with no sign yet of flagging popularity.

Preliminary boasts aside, "Dogg Food" is no more scurrilous than its predecessors, though there is enough casual violence and misogyny to go around. "Slam 'em on they backs like dominos," one rap suggests as sexual etiquette. The raps have the same basic themes as other G-funk: the rappers' skills, their craving for cash and marijuana, their willingness to get tough, their exploits with women. It's a man's world, in which money buys everything they need -- sex, drugs, respect -- and the only loyalty comes from fellow members of the "Dogg Pound Gangstas."

In "I Don't Like to Dream About Gettin' Paid," a rapper who tries to work a legal job is pulled back into the drug trade, musing, "Somehow the right way don't pay;" after making big money, he ends up "bankrupt from all the spending and gambling." "Ridin', Slipin' and Slidin' " is a tale of robberies and dope sales, while in "Respect," Daz raps, "I was raised in the church," but now, it's "do or die if I have to, on deck 24-7 and blasting if I have to."

But such sentiments are common currency in gangsta rap. Death Row's commercial advantage is that the label sells a consistent product and an attitude without tension. Although neither Daz nor Kurupt has as distinctive a voice as Snoop Doggy Dogg's sing-song, Daz's production on "Dogg Food" brings the lightest, smoothest touch yet to the Death Row style. The keyboard lines are like sea-anemone tendrils, tickling the ear and drawing listeners in, making the songs almost subliminally catchy; the bass lines undulate without pushing. Women's voices float into the songs, promising sultry comforts; the rappers luxuriate in the open spaces of the mix. Where other gangsta rap aspires to the ominous tone of suspense films or the jolting pace of action movies, "Dogg Food" is almost tranquil; take away the content of the lyrics, and it could be an album of make-out music.

The Death Row formula makes the gangster life seem like a swank men's club. It's the Playboy Philosophy plus weapons: bond with the boys, rake in the cash, take the women as spoils. The rude language helps the album appeal to nose-thumbing adolescent sensibilities and will draw the condemnations it's asking for, even as its sleaziness boosts sales. But what really makes "Dogg Food" such a commercial proposition is the escape -- simultaneously virile and pampered -- promised by the music, and no restrictions on words will be able to touch that fantasy.

Photo: Kurupt, left, and Daz, who make up Tha Dogg Pound. (Death RowRecords)